Armistice Day is commemorated every year on November 11th to remember the armistice signed between the Allies and Germany for the cessation of hostilities at the Western Front of WWI. This took effect at eleven o’clock in the morning, signified by ‘…the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918’ Westerham has always ...
Reference: 0064
Peter Finch “My dad wasn’t a rich man but he looked after his pennies. He worked for the two Doctors, Hay and Cotton. He split his week between them, as a gardener for Dr Hay and a groom for Dr Cotton. He only got labourer’s wages, about two pounds a week, but he’d put something ...
Reference: WH0164
Alongside being Dr. Hay’s gardener, Arthur Finch appears to have become his chauffeur as well, probably in the early 1930s when Dr. Cotton retired. Here he is standing on the front drive of Dr. Hay’s house, then called ‘Borde Hill’ on Vicarage Hill (now renamed as ‘Old Mill Leat’). Rosemary Pearson recalls “…Doctor Hay’s daughter Jean moved ...
Reference: WH0165
Siege Batteries of the Royal Garrison Artillery were equipped with heavy howitzers, sending large calibre high explosive shells in high trajectory, plunging fire. The usual armaments were 6 inch, 8 inch and 9.2 inch howitzers.
Reference: WH0488
Arthur Waterhouse was born in Wintle Cottages in Madan Road in 1915, the year of the first Zeppelin air-raid on London “…In 1939 I received my call-up papers on top of a bus – he laughs at this – I was going home one afternoon to see my mum when I heard a motorbike coming ...
Reference: WH0720
Arthur Waterhouse “…I went home and got my kit and my mother said ‘I’m coming with you’ but I said ‘oh no you’re not, you just stay here at home’. I went down to the Drill Hall and they were all turning up – they’d had their papers too, lots of them…” Mons Bell “…in 1939 ...
Reference: 0079
During the war, Australia raised an all volunteer force for overseas service, known as the Australian Imperial Force, which subsequently served in several theatres, including the Gallipoli Campaign, the Sinai and Palestine Campaign and on the Western Front in both France and Belgium.
Reference: WH0501
Peter Finch “…those were very exciting times for twelve year old boys like Bob Combley and myself – during the time of the Battle of Britain school was optional, so I said to my mother ‘in that case I ain’t going to school’ and she didn’t mind, she’d rather us just be around – we hadn’t ...
Reference: 0084
Barrage balloons had first appeared at the end of the first world war as ‘aprons’ to combat the emergence of fledgeling war-machines in the air, both Zeppelins and biplanes. By 1939, attack and combat from the air was serious business so the balloons re-appeared as a very necessary aerial defence. A major factory for their ...
Reference: WH0722